


Survivor

by AnonymousCapybara



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Post-Battle of Hogwarts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:00:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 840
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28308657
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnonymousCapybara/pseuds/AnonymousCapybara
Summary: A lot of people (wrongly) assumed that Lavender Brown was dead after the battle.
Relationships: Lavender Brown/Seamus Finnigan
Kudos: 4





	Survivor

A lot of people assumed she was dead after the battle. When they see her, they are constantly expressing their surprise at the fact, saying things like, “I can’t believe you made it!” and “You’re so lucky to have lived!”

The first couple of times, she thought it was because of the severity of her injuries. She knows she looks terrible, even if she hasn’t seen the full extent for herself yet. Her left eye is concealed under bandages, but Parvati told her quietly that Pomfrey wasn’t able to save it. And that’s not even mentioning the gashes all over her arms, chest, and back (and surely her face too, though she can’t see those). “They’re cursed scars, dear, I’m afraid there’s not much I can do,” Pomfrey had told her kindly.

After hearing enough surprised exclamations at her survival, Lavender begins to believe that no one expected her to survive the battle in the first place. Weak, pretty Lavender. She wasn’t meant to fight.

But she isn’t pretty anymore.

A year ago, Lavender would have been devastated. A year ago, her beauty had meant everything to her.

But Lavender is far from the same person she had been last spring- the simpering, giggling girl who had hung off of Ron Weasley’s arm like an accessory. That Lavender had not lived through hell for a year at Hogwarts. She had not survived Unforgivable Curses, had not had to sneak food from the Hog’s Head, had not yet known what it truly meant to be a Gryffindor.

She had not nursed friends back to health on cots in the Room of Requirement, wondering if she had done enough to save them. She hadn’t snuck out to spray paint walls with Seamus, praying they wouldn’t get caught and laughing with relief when they tumbled back through the hidden entrance. She had not yet had to miss her fellow classmates and fear for their lives when, one by one, they did not return to school. She had not had to stand up for her beliefs with the understanding that if her side did not win, many of her friends would likely not survive.

No, that Lavender would not recognize the Lavender who is laying in the Hospital Wing now, covered in scars and bandages and missing an eye. And she’s glad for that.

She’s been awake for about an hour and has only just managed to get Parvati to leave her side by begging her best friend to bring her a cuppa. Parvati had finally agreed, but took her sweet time leaving, playing with the hem of her robes and glancing at Lavender as though she may spontaneously combust if Parvati is not there to watch her. Lavender had rolled her one good eye at her friend.

She is only a little startled when the door to the Hospital Wing blasts open. It can’t be Parvati back with the tea yet, because she would never enter a room that way, especially a Hospital Wing, and she has only been gone for a minute. Madame Pomfrey looks to the door as if to reprimand the intruder, but obviously thinks better of it upon seeing his expression, and gestures him silently toward Lavender’s bed.

She only has a second to wonder about who it might be before Seamus Finnigan bursts into her line of sight. He looks a bit singed, which Lavender finds very fitting. Of course Seamus would find a way to fight with fire.

He stops very abruptly beside her bed, reaching his hand out as if to touch her and then immediately pulling it back, and then slumps down into Parvati’s chair, running his hand through his hair.

“Been looking for ya for ages, ya know?” He says, a cheeky grin beginning to form on his face.

Lavender, who is still bitter that so many people expected her to die, looks him dead in the eye and says, “Did you check in the morgue?”

Seamus’s head reels backward, the grin wiped clean from his face. “No,” he replies earnestly, “Why would I ever look there? If anyone could survive this mess, it’d be you, Lav.”

Lavender lays her head back on her pillow and allows herself a wan smile. Seamus was there for this whole, horrible year. Seamus had seen what she was capable of. Seamus had believed in her, had known without a doubt that she would survive.

When Parvati returns with the tea minutes later, she quietly goes to open the door, so as not to disturb the patients. She sees Lavender sitting up in bed, a grin on her bandaged face, and Seamus by her side, talking with his hands as he regales her with some outrageous tale from the battle. Without announcing her presence (and without either of them noticing) she backs slowly out the door.

She’ll take Lavender’s tea to Dean, she thinks with a smile. Maybe the two of them can commiserate over the impending loss of their best friends to a relationship with each other.


End file.
